


High Holmes Eyrie

by Tammany



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: AU, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe, Bonding, M/M, Mating Flight, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Wings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-05
Updated: 2016-04-05
Packaged: 2018-05-31 09:12:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,160
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6464509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tammany/pseuds/Tammany
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No idea where this came from. It's WAY AU--not just wings, not just Alpha and Omega, not just sexual fluidity for real and for keepsies, but all of it tossed together in an SF setting that makes sufficient sense to me. I'll put it this way--it's logically not that distant from something like McCaffrey's Pern material, except we've mucked with our own genes...</p><p>It's not all that explicit. It's just--it's this thing I wrote about Mycroft gender-switching and recognizing that means he'd really better get to work generating some heirs, as Sherlock shows no sign of getting around to it.  Feel free to ask about the logic: as a snap-shot sort of story I did not pile in all that much appendix-like stuff that would "justify:" my silly SF scenarios.</p>
            </blockquote>





	High Holmes Eyrie

High up in the mountains, in High Holme’s echoing halls and lanced towers, Mycroft felt the change. It was a subtle thing at first—a sense of confusion, of mental haze muddling the Winglord’s thoughts and sending him off to his bedchamber to curl deep into nested blankets and sleep…and sleep some more. He roused with greater difficulty come morning than once he had, and woke with a deep, bone-gnawing hunger. At first he had no idea what was happening. A touch of winter-ail? Age tapping his shoulder to request a first dance? An imbalance of some sort—too little red meat, too much greenery produced with difficulty from the hydroponics gardens? Then one day he rose and shambled slothfully toward his bathing room, and saw himself reflected in the dim black of polished granite walls.

He was softer than he had been mere weeks away, and balanced differently. He studied himself, noting wider hips—and that would explain the ache in bone and muscle from his waist to his knees—and the depth of his belly. He considered, quietly, then called his major domo in, not bothering to do more than wrap a slight furl of blanketing around his groin.

“I am transitioning,” he said, without dismay or remorse. “Apparently nature has chosen to stop pampering the brothers and sisters, and put me on notice. Life demands life.”

She cocked her head and studied him. “I see,” she acknowledged, her eyes pensive. “What next, then?”

He shrugged. “Doctors, I suppose. After that? We look for wild-wing. Alphas who have no family to hold them down. I refuse to go through all this just to mate with a Lord or Lordling. My child will belong to me and my clan, whether the father stays with us or not.”

“You don’t want to try a beta male?”

He snorted. “The lines run too thin already, as we seek for fertile partners. No. I won’t breed to less than a proper alpha. I want the genes to survive in the family.”

“You could try for a line-bred beta,” she pointed out. “Most carry the recessives, even if they don’t have the triggering dominants. It would remain a matter of the Winger lines.”

He shook his head. “No. I won’t gamble. My children will be Alpha and Omega, as my parents and grandparents back to the time of transformation.  Find me a wild-wing who may be prepared to enter a contract.”

She nodded, and slipped a personal link from her pocket, quickly tabbing in. “Preferences? Concerns?” A glimmer of a smile appeared, lighting her eyes and softening her cheeks. “You have a taste for dark fur.”

He huffed his grievance. “Healthy. Whoever I pick must be healthy, and strong, and fertile, and willing to accept status as consort in my hall, rather than demanding I raise him over me and become mere consort in my own dominion.”

“You’ll be taking someone from down the lower classes, then” she pointed out, though not as though it concerned her overmuch. “Even a lesser Lordling will want his position to top yours.”

‘Bugger that,” Mycroft said. He stretched out his wings—wide and webbed like a dragon’s, though dense with a layer of insulating fur. At full extension they reached from wall to wall of the sleeping chamber—and it was no small chamber. “What I have, I hold.”

She nodded, asked a few more questions, and went on her way, leaving her Winglord to bathe in the hot waters of the pool and groom after.

Things proceeded from there. The doctors came and evaluated the stage of the change, and set the first recorded measurements to allow them to evaluation the speed of change. Mycroft’s testicles had already begun the slow retreat into his abdomen, and the structural shift to pseudo-ovaries.

“It’s actually a better design than beta women,” he said, dryly, as he reviewed the material one evening. “Production is constant, unlike real ovaries, and the eggs are always newly produced. According to this, those of us who shift get a full renewal of fertility, as well. The transition revives and renews in many ways.”

“You are looking younger,” his PA noted, studying him. “It suits you, if you care. Your hair is growing back in over the temples…”

“Had I only thought of it sooner, I could have chosen this by intent, just to avoid baldness,” he responded, his voice tart but eyes laughing. “But it’s coming in the color of carrots, Anthea—quite as gaudy and gauche as when I was a boy.”

She looked away, smiling. “I doubt you’ll find it much of a discouragement to suitors,” she said. “Shall you grow it out?”

He scoffed. “My dear, I am still Winglord of HighHolmes. I must fly.”

“Then braid it,” she said without sympathy or sentiment. “Hell, sew a turban over it. But it’s a waste to crop it short like that.” He demurred—but one hand slipped up to fondle the new-grown lock that curled over his brow, thick and wavy and streaked in shades of autumn. “Maybe,” he said. “I do think it’s an improvement on the whole.”

The search had begun for a wild-wing—an Alpha of a lower cadet family, or one of the rare transforms who showed up in largely beta lineages. Without the support and position of the great houses, without even the roles played by lesser sons of the primary lines, Alphas and Omegas struggled to find positions. Many worked as wandering knights, serving in a WingHolme’s circle of mercenaries. Others hired out to merchants, guarding caravans tracking the long flight routes that ran both north and south and east to west across the tattered continent of Newland. Still more found work in the lowland cities, where the beta lines were strongest. Though they were bright, the truth was most people hired wildwings for their strength, their flight, and their ability to fight. They were bouncers, show-fighters, city police, officers in military units.

“There’s one, maybe?” Anthea held up a photograph of a short, intense wildwing with blazing eyes. He was fair, and Mycroft doubted he was taller than five-foot, or heavier than ten stone, if that. He took the file, letting his reading glasses slip down his nose as he studied the man’s records.

“Watson. Hmmm. Doctor—not a bad addition to our house assortment. We’re short on medical, especially the kind of practical battle surgery he’s excelled at. Injured in that idiotic mess over in Baastai. Shoulder? No…leg. No….Hum. Maybe a through and through, piercing the shoulder and then the leg. They happen often enough. I suspect he’d fit here. By all means, send an invitation to that one.”

“And this one?” Anthea handed him a folder without preamble, as he handed back Dr. Watson’s. He flipped the cover of the new folder open, and tutted—a sound that might have been meant to suggest caution or wariness, but which mainly suggested salacious approval.

“Well, well, well. Goodness. They do appear to make them pretty out in the West Country, don’t they?”

She chuckled. “I thought he’d appeal. If you want to see what he looked like younger, before the hair went silver, you can check the photos in the appendix. I doubt he will do anything bad to the Holmes mating appeal…”

“Hmm. If we could start out my ginger and end up his silver…mmmm. I think we’d be improving the stock.”

“A sensible investment, then?”

He hummed and continued to flip through the folder. “Police, and no further away than DanDerry. He could keep his job and commute if it suited him. That would make up for consort status, perhaps: he wouldn’t have to just sit around with nothing to do but sire kits.”

“Plenty would think that lazing around like that was the perfect life.”

“Not with the exclusivity clause that’s in the bonding contract,” Mycroft said, tartly. “I am not risking five hundred years of Holmes leadership on a new Alpha with dynastic ambitions. I don’t care what he has to do to make sure any kits are mine—he can chop it off for all I care, once I’ve got a few heirs. But he’s not getting the chance to marry in, then offer his own offspring to replace mine.”

Anthea gave a wicked grin. No matter what changes were taking place in her Lord’s body and in his life, he himself was reliable—forever with an eye to his own priorities.

“There are men who won’t like that much. Expect them to balk.”

“Easier to eliminate them,” he said, and gave a light little throwing away gesture. He continued to ponder the folder. “He’s intelligent. A good policeman. They’ve chosen him for their elite—the investigators, rather than the strong-arms.  Should we create similar role here, high in the eyrie, or let him go down the mountain on his own?”

“Depends on too many variables,” she said. “Personality. Ambition. If he’s out for your perch, he’s best sent down to the city, to play politics outside your immediate domain.”

“I like the looks of him. But, then, there   are   several who look likely to me. You and Sherlock should make appointments with them to come and be interviewed.” He tossed the folder aside, then rose, stretching from his perch. The wide wings shone softly in candle light, as though covered in cotton velveteen. His arms reached out, their stretch framed by the expanse of the wings behind. The carefully tailored flight suit developed to allow free movement and fashion to coexist fit his body well.

He would be a beautiful Omega, Anthea thought. He retained that unique blend of male and female traits: bone and balance and structure male, but with soft, subtle breasts blooming over a Winger’s strong pectorals, and the wide hips developing as bone itself reformed, growing in new ways. The infant heads of Wingers were even larger in proportion to their bodies than beta babies, and Omegas developed wide, open pelvises to let the babies through.

“Will you reach full development?” she asked, studying her Lord’s changing form. “Or are born Omegas wider still?

He shrugged. “I won’t break any records, no—transformation tends to be a bit less thorough than to be born to bear. But it will do, with good medical help. He flipped his wings and coasted down a level from the “office” space. “I think, my dear, that I must sleep. I tired too easily these days. You’ll work out the details of our various visitors?”

She nodded and moved to the edge of the floor space, looking down as he sat on his soft bed.  “Yes, sir. The five we picked out previously and the two you selected today?”

“Add in that one Lord Kaish suggested. He’s got potential, and it doesn’t do to offend neighbors who are as helpful as Kaish. Worst comes to worst I’ll find him a solid marriage in one of the other houses—lest prestigious, but not enough so to be insulting.”

“Very good, sir. Would you prefer Sherlock and I escort them all?”

“Yes. Four parties, two each, visits of a week separated by another. That should be enough time to evaluate them for obvious concerns, while leaving us all time to escape each other and ponder.”

“Except me and Sherlock. We’ll be scuttling back and forth like leg-spiders on the surface of a pond.”

“And isn’t it a good thing I pay you well for it?” Mycroft’s tones were bright and sweet and wicked, and he smirked at her.

She smiled. Her Lord was a handful, she thought—not someone most aides could put up with. But he and she suited each other. She allowed herself a short moment of regret that she’d not pushed to be mated to him before he began the change. But as a rare female beta Winger, she would not have been a good option in any case. Nor in truth did she think that way of Mycroft, nor he of her.

He’d be happy as an Omega, she thought. Moreso than he’d been as an Alpha. He always had liked the bold style of his prior sex in companions and lovers.

She threw Mycroft one last salute, bated her wings, cupped air, and launched, spiraling once to improve her approach to one of the lower aerial exits. Then she was gone, and her Lord, alone, lay down to sleep.

 

It was a long trip from DanDerry, at the bottom of HighHolme mountain, up to the eyrie at its peak. The little doctor found it challenging: though he could fly, his wing-shoulder and his calf both complained and tightened up over the course of the day. As the oxygen grew thinner and the air itself colder, he felt himself flagging.

The copper Alpha from DanDerry struggle too, though, to John Watson’s relief. The smaller man hated confessing the extent of his competitive nature, but it was real, and unforgiving. He felt better inside himself when, during a break along a high ridge, he was able to go over and offer his companion a spare bottle of athlete’s formula.

“Here. It will make the ascent easier. It ups your iron levels almost instantly, gives you a charge of energy, and triggers the enzymes that allow energy exchange in the muscles.”

The older man made a face, looking at the garish bottle. “Generally try to stick to things I recognize,” he said. “No ingredients I can’t pronounce.”

“Take my word for it—the sky-racers rely on this,” the doctor said, still holding out the bottle. He waited, grinning, until the copper took it grudgingly, opened it, and drank down a swig with a grimace.

“Eugh. Bad as I thought it would be,” he growled. But he didn’t spit it out, and he didn’t pour the remainder of the bottle down the abyss below them.

“Get you up the mountain looking fit. Better for a courting man than panting his way into the presence chamber.”

The older man raised a brow, and grinned a cocky, wicked grin. “No matter. I’ll claim it’s lust for His High Wingetty Lordship. Cover for me nicely, that will.”

The doctor, used to the rough humor of the military flight, chuckled along with the other man. He held his own bottle of brew in one hand, but held out the other to shake.

“John Watson,” he said. “Your competition, though I daresay we’re both already losers. Word in all the plaza coffee houses is that His Lordship took a shine to a sleek young Wingling petty-lord from a cadet house of the Estrelles. Apparently clever but not too clever, and happy enough to find a permanent roost far from his own family spires.”

The copper shrugged. “We’re third tier. Depending on the personality of his Lordship, that suggests we were either held back in hopes the others would prove better—or saved best for last, so the pain’s begun to pass before meeting the good choices. Can’t tell from here.”

“Best till last,” the sleek Wing-beta said from her perch on a crag over their picnic ground. “His Lordship couldn’t endure the thought of each round being less likely than the previous. And the cadet-Estrelle is a dear and a darling, but no match for his Lordship. We’re mentoring him into the foreign service cadre with The Omega Queen. He’ll fit in, and she’s got a niece who’d be well matched with the boy.”

The doctor and the policeman exchanged glances. Warily, the policeman said, “If you don’t mind—what’s his Lordship like?”

She smirked. “A good lord. Quiet. Not much involved in the doings around the capital.”

“Don’t believe it,” drawled the long, lanky, jet-furred Alpha who worked with her. “He’s the most dangerous man on the planet. On good days the Queen asks him permission before she starts a war. On bad days he doesn’t give her the chance to do more than thank him for saving her the effort.”

As the Union of the Transformed had not suffered a long-term serious war for over twenty years, the doctor found that bravado at best. “Oh, I see. And you know so much about our military engagements?”

The long, slim one scoffed, and looked him over. “Enough to narrow it down to either Baastai or Chardanka.” His eyes narrowed. “And that being so, I’d put my money on Baastai. Shot with a raid flight?”

Watson’s eyes narrowed. “How did you know?” He glanced at the Wing beta. “Did he cheat and read my private files?”

She shrugged, eyes narrowed to slits, face turned away to gaze into the wide skies beyond. In the distance the plains were just showing the slight line of sun fall at the farthest edge from sight. “Not so near as I can tell. But he and his brother are good at observing.”

“It’s a stunt, then?”

“No. It’s observing. Deducing. The logical art of perception and evaluation…an art that should be recognized by even the stupidest simpleton, though you may not master it any more than a grubby wingless beta masters nineteen-cubes Go.” He looked at Watson, who thought he was the eeriest, most elegant, alien looking Winger he’d ever seen: jet black curls crowning his head, eyes a crisp blue with opal tones that were unspeakably exotic, wing-nap so black and soft even the doctor, who seldom looked twice at other Alphas, found himself wanting to caress it.

Sherlock huffed. “Well? Are you done staring?”

Watson shrugged and looked away. “No offense meant.”

“None taken.” The tone, though, suggested that Sherlock was permanently offended.

“You looking for a mate, too?” Watson asked, more to still the turbulence between them than anything. The Wing beta gave a bark of laughter, then stifled herself. The Alpha himself huffed, and glowered from under low lids.

“I leave that sort of messy, animal activity to my brother, though he’s no more taste for it than I do. Let him deal with the inevitable demands of posterity.”

The copper, nibbling at a high-energy roll of preserves, oily nut-pastes, and low-land cheeses, gave a dry little laugh. “No romance waiting ahead, then?” He didn’t sound so much disappointed as resigned to find that irony was, as always, a good bet.

Anthea, the Wing-beta, shook her head ruefully. “If either of you click, I suspect you’ll find Lord Mycroft a good companion,” she said, tactfully. “And I daresay he’ll hold up his end of the bargain you’ve been offered: he’ll be generous with his own time, and turn a blind eye to any side activities you develop, so long as you respect the exclusivity clause. But, no…unless you’re powerfully aroused by the sight of an Omega doing the daily crossword, I am afraid you’ll have to wait for heat to experience much…romance.”

Lestrade grunted, and chomped contemplatively at his wrap, staring out over the plains like Anthea. At last he said, “I can deal with that. Good man?”

“Worst brother ever” competed with “Best Winglord in the land” for Lestrade’s attention. He glanced at Anthea, and then at Sherlock—and back. “Would you say your Lord’s bad to his kin, Mistress Anthea?”

“I’d say his brother’s spoiled rotten and too vain to know it,” she said, glaring at the younger man. He stuck his tongue out, but rose when she called for them to continue the last leg of the trip up to the eyrie.

“No matter how high you are, it’s still best to be home by full dark,” she said, and opened her wings and threw herself into the air, trusting it to carry her high, and higher, until she reached the top.

It was a beautiful eyrie, Watson thought, sweeping behind her as they entered one of the wide lower levels of the buildings. Trumpets were sounding from post to post, as guards announced the arrival of the courting party. It was just coming on sundown, and the lights were transforming themselves from absorptive mode to radiant mode. One by one the cold-torches twinkled to life, their cool glows each a different shade or tone, covering a million shades of light blue, green, and purple.

He sighed. He’d lost track of beauty in Baastai…and lost track of caring about beauty in the weeks and months of therapy since. This, though—it was instantly clear it was a full and proper eyrie, prepared to challenge even a great city such as DanDerry for interests and activities.

The citizens of the eyrie swirled, forming murmurations, sweeping the echoing open space of the lower pavilions, breaking apart, only to come together in new murmurations.

“This way,” Anthea said, and led them upward along paths that were not immediately obvious to either of the two men. Sherlock, trailing behind, was silent.

At last they came to a lesser space, with a floor and perches and wide tables. Anthea led them in. Sherlock with a flick, did something that raised up walls to protect the privacy of those in the room. Watson looked around, and spotted the Lord almost instantly…and was impressed.

Lord Mycroft was tall—taller even than his brother. He would tower over Watson. His wings were strong and large, his chest deep with powerful pectorals softened only slightly by prominent little breasts that stood high from the surrounding muscle. He was dressed well—indeed beautifully, in a trim jacket of foothills manufacture, and matching trousers.

Watson stirred restlessly. A handsome Omega. A beautiful Omega. Hair like a fire stirred up against the evening cold. Eyes so light they shone like the torches set around the room. Long hands, long fingers. Long, long legs. The swell of the pelvis called to something primeval in Watson. Without thinking, he stepped forward.

The growl was instant, and from four directions. His Lordship’s rumble was the most terrifying—soft, almost a purr, but deadly. It said, “Touch me without permission and you die.” The Alpha in Watson bridled at that—then met Lord Mycroft’s eyes.

Yes. The man had lived his life as an Alpha, and would never lose that authority. It was so intrinsic it didn’t even seem to speak of sex to Watson—only to power. Watson was an Alpha, and Alphas were competitive—but Watson’s instincts were good.

Sherlock and Anthea were easier to ignore—Anthea’s beta growl too light, Sherlock’s too…something. Too obviously protective but not competitive, though. Sherlock didn’t want his brother, and suffered no hormonal spike to override his reason.

Just as well…the fourth growl, Lestrade’s growl, promised a short, painful life for any Alpha who challenged him over the Omega above them. Watson glanced over, with a shiver.

Lestrade wasn’t a large Alpha—but not small, either. He was fit, and the silver nap of his wing fuzz matched the sparkle and dapple of his hair. His face was sweet—but right now the sweetness was lost in cascading desire. His wings had bated wide, arching up and over, and he flexed at knee and hip, prepared to launch at the first sign of the Omega beginning a flight.

“Lestrade….” Sherlock’s voice was dry and heavy with warning.

Lestrade shot him an irritated glance, but returned to gazing at the Omega above…who gazed back. The longer hairs at the nape of his neck, before they turned to wing-fuzz, hackled and rose, framing his neck like a dramatic collar.

Each stared, steady, unmoving.

Sherlock, Anthea, and Watson stayed still, afraid—for good reason. Only rarely did Alpha and Omega find such instant and complete attraction, and when they did it tended to override their rational selves. No one, not even other Alphas in courtship mode, wanted to cross a bating Alpha with an Omega ready to launch a flight.

Long after they came in—too long, by Watson’s standards—the Omega managed to growl a question, directly at Lestrade. “You’ve read the contract?”

The response was so feral it was hard to decide whether there were words involved—but it was, on the whole, positive.

“You’re ready to live as consort?”

More affirmative growl.

“Exclusive?”

“Yeah.” It was a rumble from so far down in the Alpha’s chest it probably provided sexual stimulation…

Mycroft nodded. “Given our—imeptuous response, you are willing to have it declared trial, not final, until we can discuss things more rationally?”

Lestrade grunted, and shifted in place.

The Omega glanced briefly at the other three. “You’re willing to announce it was agreed to while we still had the power of control?”

Watson was tempted to suggest that they’d gone beyond control the moment they’d laid eyes on each other—but he had to admit it wasn’t fair. Each man held his place, each man controlled his responses, each man communicated sufficiently, if not with great grace or language skill. He nodded, and was the first to agree to stand witness, quickly followed by Anthea and Sherlock.

Before the echoes had died Mycroft’s eyes returned to Lestrade’s. “It would appear we’re committed to a trial bond,” he said, voice tight and uncertain.

Lestrade nodded—but something made Watson suspect he was less convinced the bond would be temporary than Mycroft did. “I’ll almost certain to place my bite,” he said, warily.

Mycroft’s eyes flashed wide and hungry. His hackles rose higher, fluttering little streamers of main into the currents of the greeting room. When he spoke it was a whisper of such power you’d think it a shout. “Likewise,” he said. “My body believes you to be mine.”

Lestrade nodded.

They hesitated—then the Omega launched, beautiful in his grace and control—and the Alpha was behind him. Their voices rose in a keening, bright, high tone, like a long note on a brass horn or the lingering hum of a properly tuned bell. On and one the sound of their voices continued, and long after they’d left the greeting room Watson could hear them still.

“Well,” Watson said at last. “I never thought to see a Destiny Flight in my lifetime. Thought they were a bunch of sentimental bushwah, to tell the truth.”

“ They are sentimental bushwah,” Sherlock snapped, but he’d shrunk in on himself, battered by the power of his brother’s and Lestrade’s emotions. The scents of their arousal had flooded the room—it was like breathing sex itself.

“Drop the walls, Sherlock,” Anthea begged. “Please, if I don’t get fresh air I’m going to decide you two are necessary.”

Sherlock scrambled and complied. As the room walls fell, breeze cascaded in, and the last traces of daylight as the sun fell.

“Night flight. Will they be safe, do you think?” Watson asked, trying not to catch eyes with Sherlock or Anthea.

“Mike will see Lestrade home safe enough,” Sherlock said. His voice was thick and shivery.

“I have to go,” Anthea said.

Watson, just as driven, said cautiously, “If you’d rather not…”

She glanced at him, sniffed, and flitted away without another word.

“She’s careful of herself,” Sherlock said.

Watson flinched, but nodded. “Know any Omegas or betas who’d be willing?” The sheer need had etched itself upon him, as though claiming him no less than Mycroft and Lestrade were claiming each other.

Sherlock huffed. “Not my thing.”

Watson shrugged. “So you’ve got a boyfriend?”

“I mean, I don’t,” Sherlock snapped. Then he closed his eyes and added hoarsely, “Not that I wouldn’t tonight. I had no idea the backwash could be so….”

“Intense.” Watson finished the sentence for him.

High in the sky the ululating croon of the mating couple rang out again, raising every hair on John Watson’s body. He swore under his breath.

Sherlock, clinging to the grips of an elegant bentwood perch, swore too. “Tonight I’m making exceptions,” he snarled. “Hell. Bugger-all. If you accept it’s just reaction…”

“Accepted,” Watson snapped. “Military secret,” he added, using the slang of the war flights posted in Baastai, where sometimes need took two men who’d otherwise never look twice at another Alpha.

Sherlock nodded once, briefly, then dropped to the floor. “My quarters are this way,” he said.

Watson dropped to the floor behind him, not noticing the lack of ache in his calf or strain in his shoulder. They raced, like most of the eyrie, to find their privacy, and whatever came after, they neither ever pretend to regret the choice that began it all.

oOo

Mycroft and Lestrade flew far and flew wild, wings cutting the icy currents of the upper peaks. The flight itself was sensual as they rolled, darted, dodged each other, came together, gripped and humped in the air before letting go again, their bodies pouring out adrenaline, flooding them with excitement. Mycroft led his Alpha in a weaving path that carried them back over and over to the HighHolmes eyrie, until his muscles begged for reprieve. He dropped lightly to the wide floor of the highest minaret.

Lestrade dropped down beside him.

They panted in the dark, under the bright, clear sky, roofed with stars and moons.

“Mine,” Lestrade gasped, eyes narrow and fierce.

“Mine” Mycroft agreed, growling with the need to possess.

They stepped closer toward each other. Their hands stretched, found each other, caressed—and began a hurried job of undressing, each doing a bit of their own, a bit of their partner’s.

“Bed?” Lestrade turned without letting go his grip on the other man.

“Behind me,” Mycroft said. “Proper mating nest.”

“Wouldn’t know,” Lestrade gasped. “Never saw more than a commoner’s wedding nest.”

“You’ll like it.”

He did—it was deep and wide and warm and blessed with soft quilts and duvets and hard rolled duffels that helped him prop himself and his Omega in comfortable positions as they made love.

“You are beautiful” he growled, their first climax. “You are beautiful,” he growled on their second and third and fourth. Mycroft, as certain, growled back, “Gorgeous bastard.”

The sixth time Lestrade’s teeth graced Mycroft’s bond gland,in the nape of his neck.

“Yes,” Mycroft said.

“Temporary?”

“I doubt it,” Mycroft murmured.

He sounded so smug that even in the height of a Destiny Mating, Lestrade could only laugh. He nuzzled softly, set his teeth carefully, and bit deep. The scent of bond filled his mouth and sinuses, and even as he gasped at the reaction, Mycroft squirmed, tossing him, finding Lestrade’s own gland, biting firm and hard.

Then they mixed the scents together, mouth to mouth, scent to scent.

There were no words.

They found each other with tender hands, rolled together, touched, until both fell exhausted in the rising light of day. Lestrade tucked his love firmly against his side, covering them both with a duvet, and Mycroft grumbled a weary command to the voice controls, triggering a black bowl to rise over them and drop again, darkening their nest.

“Regrets?” Mycroft murmured.

“Hell, no,” Lestrade murmured back.

And then they slept until their second flight, later that afternoon.


End file.
